Mariangela Melato has passed away in Rome at the age of 71. The actress died this morning, around 5.00 am in a clinic in Rome. She had been fighting against cancer for quite some time already. With her we lose one of the most significant women in Italian cinema and theatre.

She was an actress endowed with great intensity, able to play the most diverse characters and master various registers. Our mind inevitably goes back to Travolti da un insolito destino nell'azzurro mare d'agosto (Swept Away), a cult movie by Lina Wertmüller in which she starred opposite Giancarlo Giannini gaining a special place in our collective cinema memory. Of course, we shouldn’t forget the work with Ronconi and Salce, Visconti and Monicelli, Garinei and Giovannini, Bertolucci and Chabrol up to Mike Hodges and his Flash Gordon in which she played the beautiful and fierce General Kala, a character able to compete against Goldfinger’s Pussy Galore in terms of appeal: Mariangela Melato was, and will continue to be, one of the greatest stars of international cinema.

She used to say: "one needs to be wary of two categories of people: those who have no personality and those who have more than one”. Mariangela had one personality only but one that was strong and remarkable. She has left us – too early – leaving behind a long series of unforgettable performances and a huge void.